


Never the Impossible

by punk_rock_yuppie



Series: Coldwave Week 2016 [5]
Category: DC's Legends of Tomorrow (TV), The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: Coldwave Week 2016, Day Five - Meta, M/M, meta!Mick, slight AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-18
Updated: 2016-03-18
Packaged: 2018-05-27 12:37:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,138
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6284836
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/punk_rock_yuppie/pseuds/punk_rock_yuppie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>"Just when I think I have learned the way to live, life changes."--Hugh Prather</i>
</p><p>Len is frozen. He can’t move, can’t breathe, can’t speak. Mick can, though, and he shouts.</p><p>“Lenny, <i>run</i>!” </p><p>Len runs.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Never the Impossible

**Author's Note:**

> here's day five! i'm really pleased with how this all came together and at some point in the future i might explore this verse a little more indepth. for now, enjoy! major thanks to elrhiarhodan for being beta, as always!

**1**

Len isn’t sure what’s happening. There had been a _bang_ , a _clank_ , and then everything was burning around him. He feels as though he’s been punched, and it takes him several long minutes to realize that Mick’s arm is secured around his waist. Mick is running and Len is bouncing with every step—he’s not sure when Mick managed to scoop him up or when they took off, but he knows the smoke is catching up to them. The air is thick with fumes and electricity. It feels like the air is humming and Len chokes on it for a brief second.

Mick takes a particular sharp corner and Len’s focus is brought back to clinging to Mick.  He grips Mick’s jacket desperately and barely resists the urge to close his eyes. An unfamiliar feeling of terror is burning in his chest—or is that the smoke in his lungs? Len’s not sure. He’s not sure about anything, at this point. It was meant to be a routine heist: get in, get monet, get out. It was meant to be easy.

Instead someone had been waiting for them and everything went sideways faster than Len could blink. She had lifted her finger and though Len didn’t see anything, he _felt_ it. He had felt it when the building around them surged and started to collapse. He felt the flames begin and grow closer.

Len is once again brought from his thoughts when fresh air hits him hard. They’re outside and Mick is still holding Len close. Len tries to look around but the way he’s pressed against Mick doesn’t allow for much movement.

“Lenny.”

“Yeah, Mick?”

Mick swallows with an audible gulp that sets Len on edge. “I need you t’run. Got it?” His grip around Len’s waist tightens for a split second before he’s dropping Len. “Run. _Run_ and don’t come back.”

Len stumbles onto his shaking legs and looks at Mick like he’s crazy. “What?” He snaps. Before he can take a step forward, though, the smoke is billowing out of the building and curling in purposeful tendrils around Mick’s body. It wraps around his ankles and arms and neck and starts to pull him back.

Len is frozen. He can’t move, can’t breathe, can’t speak. Mick can, though, and he shouts.

“Lenny, _run_!”

Len runs.

**2**

Len comes back that night.

As Mick was dragged back inside the building by the tendrils of smoke, Len had run just as instructed. He had run back to their safehouse and had hidden there until the guilt overwhelmed him.

So Len comes back that night and tries not to immediately panic when he sees little more than a heap of rubble where the building once stood. It’s clear that the fire department has been by, as patches of the lot are still wet; caution tape encases the wreckage—and for a split second, Len wonders if Mick had been found by the police. That thought in mind, he picks up his pace until the pile of steel and glass is at his feet. His legs shake and his heart is beating a mile a minute. Len stares at the pile of debris and waits. Part of him fully expects Mick to burst forth at any moment. A much more logical part of him knows Mick is lying dead here in the rubble or lying dead in the city morgue.

Len falls to his knees with a scream. Tears burn his eyes as he just _screams_. Not a word or a phrase, just an endless sound of agony. Len lurches forward and slams his fists against the ground. He doesn’t care that stray pieces of glass pierce his skin, nor does he care that dust kicks up and clogs his throat. He doesn’t feel like caring about anything in this moment.

When the scream eventually ends he throws up. It splatters to the ground in front of him and his eyes sting from the stench of bile. Len glares at the puddle of stomach acid and half-digested food. He’s so entrenched in his anger and heartache he doesn’t catch the sound of the pile shifting. His gaze is so focused on the ground he doesn’t see something rise from the center of the debris and start towards him.

Len doesn’t look up until it’s almost too late. He doesn’t startle or flinch when he realizes it’s the meta-woman from earlier. The one who had commanded air and smoke, the one who had killed Mick. Len’s fingers twitch towards his cold gun, but he’s not fast enough. A burst of smoke is flying at him before he can even reach his holster—

A second burst, one brighter and warm, intercepts the attack. The smoke dissipates and the meta screams in anger. Len follows her glare to another spot of rubble, and his heart catches in his throat.

Mick stands, almost naked and covered in fresh bright scars, and his hands are engulfed in controlled flame. He’s glaring right back at the other meta and snarling under his breath. He raises a hand and shoots another stream of fire at the woman, and she starts to burn. Len doesn’t watch, that, and tries to ignore the scent of burning flesh. He keeps his gaze trained on Mick.

Mick is _alive_. Mick is a _meta_. Mick is _collapsing_.

**3**

Len doesn’t move from the wall.

Barry had shoved him there when Len exploded in a fit of rage a few minutes prior. Len doesn’t blame him.

Len doesn’t move from the wall, not necessarily to obey Barry’s unspoken demand but rather because he can’t get his legs to stop shaking. He watches with glazes eyes as Ramon, Snow, and Barry crowd around Mick on the gurney. There are wires and tubes clinging to him and his heartbeat is too rapid on the monitor. Len isn’t a doctor, but he knows that much. He knows normal heartbeats don’t sound like that.

Len doesn’t move from the wall even when the persistent, drawn out chime of Mick flat-lining fills the room. Barry shouts something, Snow is rambling medical nonsense under her breath, Ramon is the only one not speaking for once but he has both hands on Mick’s chest trying to do compressions. Len only takes an unsteady step forward when Ramon yelps in pain.

“His skin—I can’t touch him.”

This time Barry reaches out with sparks of electricity dancing along his hands; he flinches when he presses his hands to Mick’s chest but doesn’t pull back. “It’s like he’s on fire.” Barry hisses. He pulls back and feeds a charge into his hands again, pressing on Mick again. And again. And again.

The sound of Mick dying fades to a buzz in Len’s ears. His own heart is bounding, and it feels traitorous. It feels like Len is betraying Mick by still being alive. They should’ve both been in that building when it came down. Len should never have run. Len doesn’t even make it to the edge of the gurney before he’s passing out with Mick’s death ringing in his head.

**4**

Len sits beside the bed and grips Mick’s hand no matter how much it burns. After a while, it stops hurting so vividly and fades to a dull ache. He doesn’t pull his hand back from Mick’s but he knows there won’t be marks, and not just because most of Mick’s body is wrapped in bandages. The heat comes off Mick’s body in waves and he burns to touch, but he’s not actually on fire and isn’t actually able to scar people with just his skin.

Len stares at Mick’s slack expression. He tries to ignore the tubes and wires adorning Mick and tries to pretend they’re somewhere normal, somewhere that isn’t STAR Labs. The only nice thing in the moment is that no one is lingering. Snow and Ramon have gone home for the night, and while Len knows Barry is in the building all that matters is that the speedster isn’t with _them_ right now.

Mick’s heartbeat is only a little faster than it should be. It’s been at that slightly more rapid pace for days now, and even if it’s disconcerting Len will take that sound over a flat-line any day. He strokes his thumb delicately across the bandages curled around most of Mick’s hand. He traces a familiar scar on the tip of the thumb—it’s one Mick got while mishandling scissors. Nothing dramatic or criminal, just a mundane little accident. The sliver of discolored skin is one of Len’s favorite parts of Mick’s entire body.

Len stares at Mick desperately. He can’t speak, hasn’t actually spoken for several days now, because it feels like all his emotions are tied up in his throat. It’s suffocating and terrifying and painful. Len doesn’t speak even though Snow mentioned it might help. He just stares, and hopes that Mick can hear him somehow.

**5**

Len finally corners him in the shower.

Mick has been avoiding him for weeks, now, and frankly Len is done with it. He’s done with Mick hiding at every chance he gets. It’s one thing for Mick to avoid Snow at STAR Labs, because the constant stream of tests and urine samples is undoubtedly annoying. It’s one thing for Mick to avoid the other Rogues, and they understand. It’s another thing for him to keep avoiding Len—his _husband._

So, Len corners him in the shower.

Mick hears him come in, and has to hear the lock of the bathroom door click into place after Len is inside. He can’t flee, though, because the bathroom is cramped and he’d have to essentially phase through Len to make it out without a confrontation.

Len is put off by the lack of steam filling the room. Before the incident, Mick would take showers so hot there’d be no water left for anyone else. It was a constant spot of affection and irritation for the Rogues.  Now, though, there’s no steam in the air. It’s instead replaced by a soft chill. It’s odd and so unlike Mick, but Len kind of enjoys it—he’s never been a fan of boiling hot showers.

He strips nude then joins Mick under the spray. They don’t talk; Len immediately lathers his hands with soap and drags them across Mick’s body. He doesn’t shy away from touching the scars, old or new. The new ones are no longer tender to the touch. They are fully healed and admittedly gruesome, but Len isn’t disturbed by them. He’s disturbed by how they got there, and he’s disturbed with himself for having run away when Mick needed him most. But the scars? They don’t scare Len away. Far from it.

Once the back of Mick’s body is thoroughly soapy, Len pushes at him to turn. Mick puts his back under the spray and finally looks at Len for the first time in days. Len tries to keep his own stare softer, tries to hold back a teary glare. They still don’t speak but Len sets about washing the front of Mick’s body. Len touches every single ridge of Mick’s scars.

Mick doesn’t turn away from Len to rinse, rather he just leans back into the spray and lets some fly forward and hit Len. It sparks a laugh out of the younger man, which in turns brings a smile to Mick’s lips.

“I still love you, okay?” Len murmurs as he practically seals himself to Mick’s body. His arms curl around Mick and cling to his back. He relaxes only when Mick’s own hands grasp at his hips and pull him closer.

“Thank you.” Mick whispers in return. “I’m sorry.”

Len smiles and kisses the corner of Mick’s mouth. “It’s okay.”

**6**

“Oh come on, Scarlet. Can’t keep up?” Len drawls. His legs are crossed leisurely at the knee and he’s got the cold gun drawn and resting on his shoulder. Barry stops zipping around long enough to send a glare in Len’s direction. Len just smirks in return. He locks eyes with Barry just long enough to distract him and let Mick get a shot in. Len watches from where he’s perched on a low rooftop, bag of money resting beside him, as Mick aims a fireball at the speedster.

Barry is too distracted to dodge in time; when the fire doesn’t burn and instead disappears the moment it hits his chest, though, Barry seems to think he’s won. Mick just laughs and snaps his fingers .The embers still lingering on the speedster’s suit smolder. They don’t burn through the material and nor do they hurt, but the resulting heavy smoke blinds Barry just long enough for Mick to go to Len.

Len secures his grip on the money and drops from the rooftop into Mick’s grasp. They immediately move to his motorbike, but Len can’t resist tossing one final taunt at the kid. “Better luck next time, Scarlet!”

**7**

Len’s tongue traces a particularly bright scar that mars Mick’s abdomen. Mick’s muscles clench from the ministrations and the hand he has curled on Len’s neck tightens. Len doesn’t smirk or tease, just simply kisses the skin along the waistband of Mick’s pants.

He’s spent the past several hours peppering all of Mick’s body with kisses. He’s drawn his tongue across every scar, including the ones covering Mick’s face. Mick’s cock is straining in his sleep pants and Len is in a similar predicament, but he makes no move to change that. Instead, he keeps kissing Mick’s skin until his lips feel numb.

“Lenny, c’mon.” Mick grunts with a roll of his hips. “Get up’ere.” He commands. He pulls Len closer by the neck and kisses him hard on the mouth. Len obliges, finally, and pulls his own pants down before tugging down Mick’s. Mick wastes no time in curling a calloused hand around their pricks and starts to stroke.

Len shudders and rolls his hips into the tight, slick grasp. He plants his hands on Mick’s chest and relishes the bumps and textures under his palms. He runs his hands all along Mick’s chest, skirts over his nipples before settling over the man’s heart. Len focuses on thrusting his hips in time with Mick’s hand, and focuses on listening to Mick’s thundering heartbeat.

Precome slicks Mick’s hand as he speeds up; the scars on his hands and his usual callouses tease the skin of Len’s cock, driving him closer and closer to the brink. Len gasps for air as his nails dig into Mick’s chest.

“Y’gonna come, Lenny?” Mick asks in a rumbling voice.

Len can only nod with his throat full of moans and Mick’s name. He doesn’t tilt his head back or close his eyes as he comes. He stares intently at Mick, gasping his name as his come splatters onto Mick’s hand. Mick keeps stroking until Len pushes his hand away, oversensitive. Len grins, a little bit dopey, and reaches out. He grips Mick’s cock in return and starts to stroke. It’s wet and messy with come and sweat easing the friction.

Mick groans and when he thrusts his hips up into Len’s grasps, Len’s whole body rides the motion. Mick’s hand, covered in come, finds its way to Len’s lips.

Len obeys without needing to be told. He opens his mouth and sucks on each of Mick’s fingers, tasting his own release mixing with the salty taste of Mick’s skin. He licks Mick’s palm clean then sucks his thumb into his mouth. His lips curl over Mick’s thumb and he runs his tongue over the digit, over the years-old, familiar scar at the tip of his thumb.

The hand that had previously been gripping Len’s neck has sunk to his hip. Mick grips him hard enough to bruise and hard enough to keep him steady while Mick pushes his cock into Len’s wet grasp.

Len smirks as he pulls back, letting Mick’s thumb rest on his lower lip. “Are you going to come, Mick?” He taunts right back.

Mick doesn’t answer aside from a growl. His skin burns a little hotter but Len has long since grown used to it. He doesn’t flinch away when his own skin feels too hot. He just strokes his hand faster, grips tighter, lets out a soft keening noise when Mick palms his ass.

Mick comes and it splatters onto his chest, catching him on the chin even. Len pulls back and leans down to follow the drops of come up Mick’s chest to his lips. Their tastes mingle in their mouths and Len moans.

“I’ve missed this.” Len murmurs.

Mick’s stubble scrapes Len’s face as their cheeks brush. “Me too.” He admits.

Len grins down at his husband. “It’s good to have you back, Mick.”

**8**

Mick snaps his fingers and watches, enamored, as a small flame blooms at his fingertips. He shakes his hand and the flame disappears. He snaps his fingers again and when the flame reappears, it’s larger and illuminates his face. He raises his free hand and pinches the flickering top of the flame; when he moves his hand away, the fire stretches between his palms but doesn’t stray. It’s a carefully contained stream that only flickers or grows when Mick directs it.

Len watches on with amusement.

Mick doesn’t pay him any mind, though it’s not an unkind gesture. Mick is just deeply focused on his new powers, still reveling in the strength and ability.

Len doesn’t take it personally. He knows if he were in the same situation, he would probably be the same way. Mick’s ability to conjure up fire at will and direct it however he pleases is one to envy. If Len could do the same with ice, he would likely be as intent on mastering his powers as Mick seems to be.

Mick’s brow furrows in concentration and suddenly the stream of fire becomes a few small fireballs. They bounce between his hands as he juggles them, a smile blooming on his lips.

Len brightens with a fond smile of his own. When Mick looks up, Len doesn’t pretend he hasn’t been staring. He catches Mick’s gaze and nods to the fire in his hands. “Having fun?”

Mick’s grin widens and reveals his teeth. “Oh yeah.” He taunts; the fireballs converge into a single stream again, then curl to form a single ball that he rests in one hand. Mick’s body is relaxed, calm, at ease in a way Len hasn’t seen for weeks. Mick has always been comfortable with fire and that comfort only grew after the explosion. Even when he was recovering or even when he clearly felt distraught over what had happened, Mick took comfort in flames licking his skin.

And Len takes comfort in that.


End file.
